Continuing …..

Background: I have set out the evidence that indicates the Persian provinces of Yehud (Judea) and Samaria were polytheistic societies, worshiping Yahweh, yes, but a Yahweh as part of a pantheon of deities. Judaism as we recognize it only surfaces in the archaeological record in the Hellenistic period, from around the mid third century BCE. I have found Russell Gmirkin’s comparisons of biblical literature with Greek and other Near Eastern literature to be thorough and his case for the biblical literature being indebted for most part to Greek works solid. As for how to validly recover history of ancient Israel and Judah I side with those who place the archaeological record first and use that archaeological data to understand the contexts and purposes of the later narratives of the Bible. Compare Troy: we can either interpret all the finds of Troy through our reading of Homer, or we can study the remains of Troy to better understand the later works of Homer.

One notable archaeologist has effectively declared that there can be no debate concerning the strength of evidence for the existence of a Samaritan Temple of Yahweh on Mount Gerizim in the Persian period, and that this temple was built and functioned according to the biblical laws of purity, cult and commandments. Others have repeated his dogmatic claims and even used them to argue for some early form of Deuteronomy existing as early as Persian times — thus overturning the hypothesis that biblical literature did not primarily emerge until Hellenistic times. So extensive is the evidence for the existence of this Persian period temple that the same archaeologist has said it can be appreciated through the following:

Extensive answers to the questions raised [i.e. the archaeological evidence for a fifth-century date of the Temple on Gerizim] can be found in three books published in the JSP series (Judea and Samaria Publications, volumes 2, 7 and 8), and in additional articles, all in English.^[1]

Yitzhak Magen’s assertions of “unequivocal proof” of a Gerizim Temple in Persian times have been repeated by others, again with specific citations:

The archaeological digs carried out by Yitzhak Magen from 1982 to 2006 have confirmed the existence of a Samaritan temple on Mt. Gerizim although, so far, only its temenos (surrounding precinct) has been unearthed. . . . ⁶

⁶ . . . On the Samaritan sanctuary and its dating, see (Magen 2007; 2008b, pp. 97–205). . . . ^[2]

In this series of posts we are looking for the evidence said to be found extensively in

• JSP series, volumes 2, 7 and 8;
• and perhaps then additional articles by Magen in English

The last post looked at volume 2 of the JSP (Judea and Samaria Publications) series. Do we find anything more decisive in volume 7?

JSP Series, Volume 7

Or more completely referenced:

Magen, Yitzhak. The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan. Translated by Edward Levin. JSP Series 7. Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008.

Here on page 10 we learn that Magen interprets details in the Book of Nehemiah according to his belief that the Mount Gerizim temple existed in Nehemiah’s time. And that belief is said to be grounded in archaeology:

According to the archaeological finds from Mt. Gerizim, the first phase of the sacred precinct was built in the Persian period, in the fifth century BCE . . .

But Magen then concedes that there is some room for doubt on this point so draws a bottom line:

What we know for sure is that the historical and archaeological background of the erection of the temple is firmly entrenched in the fifth century BCE, at the time of Nehemiah and Sanballat.^[3]

Despite that dogmatic statement, I am still waiting to read where Magen explains how we “know for sure”. Reading on I come once again to Magen’s insistence that there is archaeological evidence for (Pentateuchal/biblical) purity laws and their forbidding of any links with paganism being observed in this early time:

Sanballat controlled the sacred site of Mt. Gerizim, with its ancient tradition that was untainted of paganism, and which was one of the most ancient such sites in the Land of Israel.^[4]

But elsewhere Magen was not so sure about those purity observances (as we noted in the previous post):

[I]t appears that the prohibition of graven images and likenesses was not scrupulously observed during the Persian period. This is evident in the material culture of the time, such as the images on coins from this period, both Samaritan and Jewish.^[5]

See also the post: Comparing Samaria and Judah/Yehud – and their religion – in Persian Times.

I ought to point out that I am not claiming that there was no temple on Mount Gerizim prior to the Greek conquests of Alexander. What is problematic is the dogmatic assertion that that temple did exist and the murkiness of what is said to be the evidence for it. I am sure the Samaritans did have a temple somewhere. But whatever its location, as pointed out above and related posts, it was almost certainly a temple dedicated to Yahweh along with other gods and knew nothing of some of the most distinctive commands of Deuteronomy or other Pentateuchal books (e.g. that only one place of worship was permitted).

Indeed, Magen’s following remarks could be understood as supportive of such a (polytheistic) temple:

The silence of the Book of Nehemiah and of other books written or redacted in the fifth to fourth centuries BCE concerning the existence of the temple at Mt. Gerizim has not been satisfactorily explained. Every people and every populace worshiped some god; why, then, would it be exceptional for the governor of Samaria to build a temple to the God of Israel at Mt. Gerizim? In the Iron Age and Persian period, temples were found everywhere, and the exiles who went to Babylonia and Egypt almost certainly prayed in temples; the Elephantine temple was not the only one. We may assume that the Jewish and Samaritan communities in Egypt and in other places of exile continued to worship YHWH at some sort of altar or temple. The sole acceptable fashion of worshiping a deity, whether YHWH or some other god, was by the construction of altars, shrines, and temples and offering sacrifices and burning incense.^[6]

And then we come to this most telling paragraph (my bolding):

The period between the destruction of Samaria and the establishment of the Samaritan temple at Mt. Gerizim in the fifth century BCE remains an enigma, leaving us with neither an archaeological nor a historical glimpse into the nature and religion of the population of the region of Samaria. This lack of information has impeded our understanding of Samaritan history in the Persian period.^[7]

But there are archaeological glimpses^[8], and they do not favour Magen’s assumptions or assertions to the contrary.

JSP 7 is not very enlightening about the evidence for the Persian period Gerizim Temple. Let’s look at Magen’s third reference.

JSP Series, Volume 8

The title for this volume:

Magen, Yitzhak. Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City. Translated by Edward Levin and Carl Ebert. JSP Series 8. Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008. 

Surely in a volume with the title “Temple City” we will at last meet some of the “extensive” evidence promised us. Magen points out, however, that the archaeological finds point to cultural continuity in the region of Samaria from the days of the biblical northern kingdom of Israel through to the Persian period. I am sure he does not mean that the biblical notoriety of Samaria’s “paganism” continued into Persian times alongside his Gerizim Temple, but how else are we to understand the following observation?

The settlement upheaval and the destruction of the Northern Kingdom occurred in the late eighth century BCE, followed by Assyrian resettlement of peoples brought from neighboring lands with the remnant left in Samaria. These fateful historical events left hardly any traces in the material culture of Samaria.^[9]

We have seen that Yonatan Adler has observed clear markers in the material culture that point to the emergence of a community’s observance of Pentateuchal laws. Yet it appears that Magen has to confess that there is no comparable evidence in the case of Persian period Samaria.

Recall the Elephantine correspondence with the priests of Samaria indicating that Samaritan religion embraced a pantheon of gods along with Yahweh. Was there really no change in the Persian period from the Iron Age religion? Is not the case for a Hellenistic origin of what we know as Judaism (and the Pentateuchal laws) becoming a little more likely?

Vridar posts setting out the evidence that we do have for Samarian religion in Persian times:

• Questioning the Hellenistic Date for the Hebrew Bible: Elephantine ‘Jews’
• Judah and Samaria in Persian Times — the Evidence (and a way out of a quandary)
• Comparing Samaria and Judah/Yehud – and their religion – in Persian Times

Magen’s list the “archaeological finds” that “date the temple at Mount Gerizim” to Persian times begin with the pottery:

The ceramic assemblage presented here was taken predominantly from the clean pre-Hellenistic loci of the sacred precinct, which also yielded Persian-period coins. Most of the pottery vessels are characteristic of the Persian period and include juglets, flasks, cooking pots, kraters (frequently ornamented with wedge decorations), bowls (some red-slipped and burnished), lamps with a flat base, and fragments of Attic vessels.^[10]

Nowhere, though, does Magen explain how that pottery dated to Persian times should be interpreted as evidence for a temple nearby.

Similarly with the coins discovered in the “sacred precinct” of Mount Gerizim. Of the thousands of coins uncovered there^[11] 72 date from the Persian period. Of these 72 coins Magen explains the early coins attest the existence of the sacred precinct in that century.^[12]

Unless I missed it, Magen does not explain how these coins are evidence for the sacredness of the area. Other sites with abundant finds of coins he interprets differently:

In both buildings, about 885 coins were found, lending support to the notion that these public buildings were involved in commercial activities taking place at the city gate.^[13]

and

The structure yielded 158 coins, more than were found in the other structures, which also indicated this was a public structure.^[14]

Why a sacrificial site should be interpreted as a temple Magen leaves unexplained. As noted earlier, he does acknowledge that simple shrines and altars were (surely more commonly) set up for that purpose.^[15]

I suppose the abundance of bones from sacrificed animals in the same area where the Persian period coins were found and the fact that there was a gated wall separating that space from the wider area secures Magen’s interpretation that the coins found here must be interpreted as indicating something more sacred than normal commercial activity. But evidence for a temple structure is not provided.

But while on the subject of coins….

Let’s take a look at those Persian period coins. As per the previous post:

The earliest coin discovered at the excavations … is a silver drachma from Cyprus (Soli?), roughly dated to 480 BCE.^[16]

Now let’s look at some other coins lest this one above be thought of as an outrageous anomaly. The following samples are said to have been minted in Samaria and belong to the Persian period.^[17]

^[18]

^[19]

^[20]

^[21]

Magen sums up the evidence:

To conclude this section on the dating of the first phase of the sacred precinct, we may state with a great degree of certainty that on the basis of the pottery, coins, and C-14 testing, the first phase of the precinct was built in the fifth century BCE. ^[22]

He has indeed shown readers pottery and coins from the Persian period but nowhere explained how those finds demonstrate the existence of a nearby temple. Later, he writes:

[T]he archaeological finds from Mt. Gerizim attest that “Sanballat the Horonite,” mentioned in the Book of Nehemiah (Sanballat I), established a temple at Mt. Gerizim.^[23]

Magen certainly listed archaeological finds from the Persian period but nowhere explained how those finds demonstrate the existence of a nearby temple.

Perhaps we need to turn to the articles he mentioned. We will look at some of those in the next post in fading hopes of being informed of his “unequivocal proof” for a Persian period Mount Gerizim temple.

Notes

^[1] Yitzhak Magen, “Dating of the Samaritan Temple on Mt. Gerizim. Yitzhak Magen’s Response,” Biblical Archaeology Society, September 6, 2012, https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/scholars-study/magens-response/.

^[2] Jonathan Bourgel, “The Samaritans during the Hasmonean Period: The Affirmation of a Discrete Identity?,” Religions (Basel, Switzerland) 10, no. 11 (2019): 2, https://doi.org/10.3390/rel10110628. I was alerted to Bourgel’s reference by Peter Kirby’s post on earlywritings forum: https://earlywritings.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14039. The citations Bourgel provides are problematic for anyone seeking material evidence for a Persian period temple on Gerizim and will be discussed in posts here. Bourgel’s assertion of “confirmation” of the temple proves to be as hollow as Magen’s claim in the above quotation.

^[3] Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, trans. Edward Levin, JSP Series 7 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008), 14.

^[4] Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, 11.

^[5] Yitzhak Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, trans. Edward Levin and Carl Ebert, JSP Series 8 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008), 153,

^[6] Yitzhak Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, 10

^[7] Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, 14.

^[8] See Comparing Samaria and Judah/Yehud – and their religion – in Persian Times

^[9] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 167.

^[10] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 167.

^[11] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, ix.

^[12] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 168.

^[13] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 19.

^[14] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 74.

^[15] Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, 14.

^[16] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations III The Coins., 84.

^[17] Yitzhak Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations III The Coins., JSP Series 19 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2022), 131f.

^[18] Ya‘akov Meshorer and Shraga Qedar, Samarian Coinage, (Israel Numismatics, 1999), 83, no. 1.

^[19] Meshorer and Qedar, Samarian Coinage, 106, no. 127.

^[20] Meshorer and Qedar, Samarian Coinage, 112, no. 159.

^[21] Meshorer and Qedar, Samarian Coinage, 120, no. 204.

^[22] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 169.

^[23] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 173.

This post follows on from An Attempt to Date a pro-Samarian Deuteronomy to the Persian Period — which in turn was a response to When was the pro-Gerizim book of Deuteronomy written?

As a rule of thumb it is not a bad idea to consult scholarly authorities to learn “what’s what”. But scholars are also human and fallible, and sometimes have their own agendas that they attempt to push on less than attentive readers. So another rule, more precise than measurement by random thumbs, is this: it is an even better idea when consulting scholarly authorities to be alert for the evidence they cite to support their “what’s whats”.

That little gem of wisdom came to me when I noticed a case for the Book of Deuteronomy, at least in some early Samaritan form, being composed in Persian times. The starting point of the Persian period argument was to appeal to the authoritative declarations of an archaeologist who has had the Albrightian habit of interpreting archaeological finds in ways that would ensure confirmation of some plausible interpretation of biblical narratives.

To argue, against Gmirkin, that the Book of Deuteronomy was composed well before the Greeks, indeed in those Persian times we associate with Haggai and Zechariah, Nehemiah and Ezra, the claim was made that it was in significant part written against the backdrop of a Temple to Yahweh on Mount Gerizim in Samaria. Deuteronomy’s insistence that only one place of worship was permitted, along with the various other purity laws, rituals and commandments, all made sense given the authoritative assurance of a standing Temple. (For an explanation of how it was Deuteronomy that came to be specifically related to the Samaritan temple see an earlier post: The Samaritan Tenth Commandment.)

But alas, the opening line of that argument is an appeal to authority but when we look for the supporting evidence we find nothing but dust and ashes being scattered in the wind.

Here is the beginning of the argument per the earlywritings forum:^[1]

From Yitzhak Magen, regarding the temple at Gerizim (ca. 475-445 BCE, i.e. the “middle” and before 445 BCE), based on archaeological excavations:

The archaeological excavations at Mt. Gerizim proved unequivocally that the temple on the mount was built in the middle of the fifth century B.C.E., that is, most likely before Nehemiah’s arrival in 445 B.C.E.

It is always handy to have an overpowering descriptor like “unequivocally” when one fails to provide specific evidence. And it is specific evidence that another scholar had asked of Yitzhak Magen:

I have a question . . . . Magen states that his excavations reveal that the Temple on Gerizim was built in the time of Nehemiah . . . . It seems to me that the archaeological evidence for a fifth-century date would have to be quite powerful to overcome the documentary evidence. And since there is nothing remaining of the Gerizim temple itself . . . . . strong archaeological evidence for the earlier date would be most enlightening.^[2]

Magen responded with his “proved unequivocally” declaration quoted above. He indicated that the proofs were so “extensive” that they could not be summarized briefly but required the reading of three books and additional articles:

Extensive answers to the questions raised in this letter can be found in three books published in the JSP series (Judea and Samaria Publications, volumes 2, 7 and 8), and in additional articles, all in English.^[3]

“More specifically”, Magen continued, there is an argument he derives from a reinterpretation of details found in the Book of Nehemiah. I will set that argument aside because it reminds us of the bad old days when “biblical archaeologists” were notorious for finding ways to interpret archaeological finds that marvellously “proved” some particular interpretation of the Bible. We have no independent evidence to confirm that Nehemiah has any serious relationship to historical events of the Persian period, however the text is interpreted. Until such evidence is forthcoming it is best to guard against interpreting the archaeological evidence tendentiously in the light of the Bible. (I have discussed scholarly critiques of the historical value of Nehemiah “extensively” on this blog: search “Nehemiah” alone for core arguments and then “Nehemiah and Finkelstein” for additional archaeologically-based criticisms.)

So let’s assume that the archaeological evidence for a Mount Gerizim Temple in the Persian period is so vast and overwhelming that one can only grasp it by reading three volumes and various articles. I will for most part therefore confine the following discussion to the works Magen signalled:

• JSP series, volumes 2, 7 and 8;
• and perhaps then additional articles of his in English

JSP Series, Volume 2

More completely referenced, this work is

• Magen, Yitzhak, Haggai Misgav, and Levana Tsfania. Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I: The Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan Inscriptions. Translated by Edward Levin and Michael Guggenheimer. JSP Series 2. Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004.

On page 12 Magen writes,

The archaeological finds prove that Josephus was indeed mistaken in ascribing the construction of the temple to the days of the fourth century BCE Sanballat, Alexander’s contemporary.

That remark pulled me up because I thought I had been reading carefully up to that point and could not recall reference to such probative archaeological finds. Was Magen going to list those finds later? A review of the table of contents and other skimming left me thinking there was no room for a later explanation. Perhaps the evidence would be covered in later volumes. But till then, it appeared that Magen was referring to what the reader should already know. So I re-read the preceding pages and took closer note of this passage (my bolding):

The many coins and pottery vessels discovered in the  sacred precinct attest to the construction of the temple in the Persian period, during the fifth century BCE. The finds include pottery, as well as 68 coins from the  fifth and fourth centuries BCE (preceding the arrival  of Alexander the Great in the Land of Israel).

The  earliest coin dates from 480 BCE. The temple on Mt. Gerizim was thus built in the  days of Sanballat the Horonite (Sanballat I), governor  of Samaria in the days of Nehemiah, who arrived in  the Land of Israel in 444 BCE (Neh. 2:1-10).^[4]

I re-read pages 1 to 10 again – and again. How could coins and pottery vessels in themselves stand as witnesses to a temple nearby? On page 1 Magen had written that

A sacred precinct with a temple to the God of Israel that was built in the Persian period, during the fifth century BCE, stands on the highest part of the  mountain.

(We will see in a future post how Magen finds other ways of interpreting the significance of what coin finds indicate when they are not needed to somehow witness to a nearby temple.)

I was still looking forward to reading the supporting evidence for that temple. On page 3 I read the following:

The sacred precinct, centered around the temple, was built on the highest point on the mountain . . . . The excavations revealed two main  construction phases: the precinct and the temple were  first built in the fifth century BCE, during the Persian  period . . . .

Still waiting for the evidence for this temple. First, a description of the sacred precinct itself is presented:

The early precinct measured 98×96 m. . . . , including the gates. This square structure was built of hewn fieldstones extracted from  the mountain’s exposed upper strata of rock. . . .

The rooms around the inside of  the precinct wall are reminiscent of the open-roofed  chambers and courtyards mentioned in Ezekiel,  in whose vision of the Temple in Jerusalem they  were used by the Temple officiaries for cooking the  sacrifices brought by the people (Ez. 46:22-24).

The structure of the Persian period precinct, in particular the six-chambered gates, bear a resemblance  to the description of the Temple in Ezekiel (ch. 42) and to that of the future Temple in the Temple Scroll found  at Qumran, which is itself based to some extent on  Ezekiel’s description. The consistency of the remnants  of the sacred precinct on Mt. Gerizim with the  descriptions of the Temple in these two sources would  seem to support the claim by Josephus that the temple  on Mt. Gerizim was constructed on the model of the Temple in Jerusalem (Ant. 13:256).^[5]

Your mileage may differ from mine, but I don’t see how such comparisons with the Book of Ezekiel (otherwise unattested until the Hellenistic period) and its vision of a wall and cooking rooms can confirm the existence of a Temple within those walls in the Persian period. My difficulty in agreeing with Magen’s method here is compounded by the fact that he had already stated – twice – that that wall had even been “rebuilt” in Hellenistic times:

In the third century BCE, in the Hellenistic  period, the temple and the sacred precinct were  rebuilt . . . .^[6]

In the Hellenistic period, under Seleucid rule (early  second century BCE) the precinct and temple were  rebuilt.^[7]

If the evidence for the existence of that “rebuilt” temple and its supposedly related wall were more secure for the Hellenistic era, would not that kind of archaeological evidence stand in favour of Russell Gmirkin’s hypothesis? So far Magen has failed to provide any material evidence for the existence of a temple in the Persian period. Suggesting that the evidence we do have belongs to the “rebuilt” wall in the Hellenistic period does not provide strong help for his case.

But I continue to re-read these first ten pages looking for “other evidence” for this temple that I may have missed. Here is the next item:

A great number of finds were discovered on Mt. Gerizim, including hundreds of thousands of burnt animal bones inside thick layers of ash, thus testifying  to the existence of a temple dedicated to the God of  Israel in which sacrifices were offered.^[8]

No date is cited for those bones but I suspect they would include the sacrifices offered throughout the Hellenistic era. There are other questions arising, too. Magen explains in a later publication (JSP vol 7) that sacrifices were performed at a variety of sacred sites and not only at temples:

We may assume that the Jewish and Samaritan communities in Egypt and in other places of exile continued to worship YHWH at some sort of altar or temple. The sole acceptable fashion of worshiping a deity, whether YHWH or some other god, was by the construction of altars, shrines, and temples and offering sacrifices and burning incense.^[9]

So remains of sacrificed animals are not necessarily evidence for a temple at all.

I also fail to see how one could determine the god to whom the animals were sacrificed from the bones themselves. After all, we do know that Yahweh-worshiping contemporaries with close relations to the Samaritans during the Persian period worshiped Yahweh alongside other deities. See the post Comparing Samaria and Judah/Yehud – and their religion – in Persian Times for details.

Magen cites late rabbinical and biblical sources to explain the meaning of other finds on Mount Gerizim. There were many bathtubs in private houses and these are presented as evidence that priests were following the Pentateuchal laws for priests to maintain purity when at the temple:

According to the Pentateuch ritual cleansing is performed by bathing in water . . .  (Lev. 14:8 et passim). . . . . It would thus seem that the many bathtubs found on Mt. Gerizim were intended for the use of the temple priests, who were required to remain in a state of ritual purity at all times, not only when serving in the temple.^[10]

^[11]

Finally, we have another “proof” of the observance of biblical laws – and by implication the Persian period existence of the ideology we read about in Deuteronomy:

The finds on Mt. Gerizim indicate very strict observance of the commandment “You shall not make  for yourself an idol” (Ex. 20:4). No human or animal  images of any kind were unearthed in the excavations . . . ^[12]

Except that Magen appears to have changed his mind shortly afterwards (in JSP 8) when he wrote, instead, that:

it appears that the prohibition of graven images and likenesses was not scrupulously observed during the Persian period. This is evident in the material culture of the time, such as the images on coins from this period, both Samaritan and Jewish.^[13]

As noted above (see note 4) the earliest coin is dated 480 BCE. Here is a photograph of that coin (not provided by Magen) held in the British Museum:

^[15]

A graven image of a lion and an Egyptian ankh! Hardly indicators that they marked the presence of the Deuteronomist’s Temple! And apparently dated 480 BCE though of course we have no way of knowing how many hands it had felt and purses it had inhabited before it found its way to Mount Gerizim.

But we are moving away from the first of several readings Magen advised for us. In the next post we will look at more of Magen’s “extensive” evidence for the temple on Mount Gerizim in the Persian period.

Notes

^[1] Peter Kirby, “When was the pro-Gerizim book of Deuteronomy written?,” Biblical Criticism & History Forum, September 19, 2025, https://earlywritings.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14343.

^[2] John Merrill, “Dating of Samaritan Temple on Mt. Gerizim. Merrill’s Letter,” Biblical Archaeology Society, September 6, 2012, https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/scholars-study/merrills-letter/.

^[3] Yitzhak Magen, “Dating of the Samaritan Temple on Mt. Gerizim. Yitzhak Magen’s Response,” Biblical Archaeology Society, September 6, 2012, https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/scholars-study/magens-response/.

^[4] Yitzhak Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I: The Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan Inscriptions, trans. Edward Levin and Michael Guggenheimer, JSP Series vol. 2 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004), 10.

^[5] Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I, 6.

^[6] Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I, 1.

^[7] Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I, 6.

^[8] Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I, 9.

^[9] Yitzhak Magen, The Samaritans and the Good Samaritan, JSP Series vol. 7 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008), 14.

^[10] Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I, 10.

^[11] Yitzhak Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations III The Coins, JSP Series vol. 19 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2022), 83.

^[12] Yitzhak Magen et al., Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume I: The Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan Inscriptions, trans. Edward Levin and Michael Guggenheimer, JSP Series vol. 2 Judea and Samaria Publications 2 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004), 10.

^[13] Yitzhak Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, trans. Edward Levin and Carl Ebert, JSP Series vol. 8 (Israel Antiquities Authority, 2008), 153.

^[14] Magen, Mount Gerizim Excavations. Volume II, A Temple City, 194.

^[15] Sir George Francis Hill, Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Cyprus (The Trustees, 1904), Plate XIII.